She Who Fights Monsters
by Claire Saunders
Summary: Allison is a hunter and survivor in many ways. But, in a time when one wrong decision led to another, she has to face the consequences of her actions. Sometimes it takes a plunge into the deep end - and a trip to rock bottom - to bring her back. Rating may be subject to change.


**I do not own Teen Wolf or Harry Potter. Any characters and plot points you recognise belong to their respective creators. Wherever it deviates, belongs to me. More notes at the end!**

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_Whoever fights monsters should see to it_  
_that in the process he does not become a monster._  
_And if you gaze long enough into an abyss,_  
_the abyss will gaze back into you._

_**Friedrich Nietzsche**_

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**PROLOGUE**

I don't like buying into the cliche that London is a dreary city with shitty overcast weather and a slew of office workers bundled up in monochrome coats, rushing between buildings to get out of the rain, but it's kind of matter-of-fact here. Maybe a year ago, I wouldn't have called Beacon Hills a town full of sunshine, but here we are. But I have no real place to complain. I brought this upon myself.

I'm walking; walking in the midday lunch hour crush, trying not to think about anything in particular. Honestly, I've been doing a lot of that these days. I have to be out of the apartment and around other people; if not I might just go insane. People-watching calms me down whenever I feel that ugly surge of anxiety rise. Immersing myself in their problems and not mine seems to be the only solution to my guilt.

It's easy to blend in around here because nobody stops to ask why you're just loitering around a city centre without a reason. London is bigger, fuller, and also more impersonal than Beacon Hills. When we were talking about going a vacation after the Incident, Dad asked me to pick a spot and I think even he was surprised. He probably expected I'd go for somewhere outdoorsy and tranquil, to places I used to dream of visiting when I was a child. The Scotland Highlands. New Zealand, maybe. But instead, I picked one of the most bustling cities in the world; congested, noisy and filthy. It's not an ideal place for relaxation and reinvention, like he'd hoped.

That's just the thing, though. I don't know if I _can_ reinvent myself. Not this time.

I see Boyd in my dreams, his face twisted and mangled with each arrow I shoot into his body. I wake up from nightmares of blood and screams; faces of people I'd hardly known but whose bodies lie contorted across the halls of Beacon Hills High. They say your demons festers in your unconscious and now I wholeheartedly agree. But at this time, I'm sure if it's punishment or indulgence.

Even when I'm awake - if I'm not careful - I see them all. I remember every bad feeling stored up inside me that's related to werewolves. How much I wanted to hurt Erica if she went an inch closer to Scott. Whether she had the intention to hurt him or love him. Even then - way before I broke - I think it partly jumpstarted all those events leading up to the Incident. I wanted to hurt them for hurting me, or just trying to. It didn't matter if they didn't know what they were doing.

Not all werewolves of course, but even so, when I'm at my darkest, I get confused. My memories fade, blur and mesh with one another and I think I really did shoot Scott through the neck with my crossbow.

But he wasn't the one I killed. I think that's my consolation; that I never stabbed the boy I loved so many times I lost count, that I never managed to slice right through the thick werewolf hide to his beating heart. I never hurt my boyfriend. I hurt Isaac instead, an acquaintance. Someone I didn't really know.

...Did I really do so much better?

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"Where have you been?" Chris Argent asked briskly – almost sternly – just as the front door opened, clearly perturbed at his daughter's absence.

"Just went for a walk, Dad, like always." Allison's gaze never met his as she pulled her hood down and shrugged her coat off her shoulders, putting it on a hanger. She ducked past where her father was standing at the end of the hallway to the kitchen, and busied herself making tea. Neither father nor daughter spoke as the kettle was set on the stove and Allison continued poking about in the cupboards and refrigerator.

Shaking his head slightly, Chris quietly studied his daughter for awhile; her back was adamantly turned to him. Outwardly, Allison hadn't changed much. Her long dark hair sat in a curly mess atop her tall, slender frame, although it was evident that she'd taken a dislike to washing it as frequently as she used to. She wore no makeup and rarely concerned herself with any upkeep of her appearance in general. She was eating, but at odd hours and Chris didn't think she was even cooking anything. It was usually ham or peanut butter sandwiches, bags of potato 'crisps' (oh London), or takeaways. Couple that with her weird, unpredictable schedule and constant emotional shutdown and he was, for want of a better phrase, worried and scared shitless.

There she was again, making herself a peanut butter sandwich. "It's one o'clock in the morning, Alli. You've been out all day."

"I don't like being cooped up here. You know that, Dad," she replied, not once turning to face him.

Nothing more. "Did you even eat?"

"Sure. This is just a snack."

"Allison-" Chris started but he knew she could sense what he was going to ask her next. Allison picked up her tea and sandwich and hastily stalked past him. By the time he'd gotten to her door, it was closed and, unsurprisingly, locked. Music was heard moments later, but she was smart enough not to crank the volume up to something unbearable.

Chris sighed and pressed his forehead against the doorframe. Admittedly, seeing his little girl distance herself from him like this was painful. He thought he'd seen the end of it after Gerard was put away; his father was stuck in a retirement home frothing at the mouth with black supernatural gunk and could no longer manipulate his daughter. But Allison never came back from the darkness and hatred Gerard had sewn into her heart. That was as much as he could observe from where he was. This was just once of many stunted "conversations" they had had over the course of the past weeks in London.

But this time, he really had cause to speak to her. Shifting slightly so his ear was pressed against the wood, he could hear her shuffle around her room. "Allison," he said firmly at the closed door, knocking on it several times. "Open the door."

The shuffling stopped but no answer came. However, in the small gap between the floor and door, Chris could see Allison's shadow shift. The music turned down a little. She was listening.

"Fine. If you're not going to open the door, we'll just have to have this conversation like this." He took a deep breath. "I know you've been going through a lot lately. Some of that happens to be my fault. I kept so many things from you... including what you are and what our family represents. I've got a lot of making up to do from now on, but I can't do it outside this door. I'm asking you to let me in."

In response, the shadow under the door moved away and the light in the room was put out.

He called out to her a couple more times, trying to reach out without actually pleading. Argents didn't plead; they didn't beg for anything in their lives and Chris wasn't going to start now. Allison was too smart for that anyway; in her state, she knew she had nothing left to lose. A dead end was a dead end for her, particularly now.

Sighing in aggravation, Chris pushed himself away from the wall, stared at the closed, darkened room one last time before turning away for the night. His frustrations gnawed at him, and if it wasn't for the late hour he would have probably started yelling at her to just _look_ at him. Yet, he knew better. Not for the consideration of others but the constant protection of the only person he had left that was more important to him than anything.

Allison had chosen London, not Chris. He had even tried to talk her out of it initially, adamant that they choose somewhere State-side. But he could see it in her eyes the day they decided they needed a break after that had happened during the massacre: the distance was crucial. Chris never spoiled his daughter, but she's his only daughter. They were focused on getting things back to normal - lightening the mood if it was possible. So Chris agreed in silent fret, and they packed their bags and they got on a plane.

He walked towards the spare bedroom in their apartment - a rental, but spacious enough for all their belongings; the things Chris couldn't bear to leave unattended in Beacon Hills, knowing its propensity for the supernatural. He kept the room under lock and key for extra security, but he would have to be daft to not realise Allison would try to sneak in there. He had caught her just once, two days ago, holding one of the butterfly knives in her hands almost reverently. After a few minutes, she set it back in its original casing and put it away carefully. She had also eyed the bow and arrow quiver mounted on the wall opposite her, but didn't go anywhere near it. Chris hadn't told his daughter of his plans to go to London at least a little bit prepared for…something. He knew she must have been curious, but she said nothing to him in the days following.

Standing right then in what was effectively a miniature armoury, Chris ran his hands over the smooth metal of various knives, and the familiar grips of firearms. Some of it was Gerard's old stash, some of it from Chris' own collection. Being a salesperson of government-issue weapons meant he could ship these on the pretense of business. They had arrived a couple of days after they had settled into their new abode.

But as Chris glared at nothing in particular at the memory of his father, he caught himself and tried to push it from his mind. For one thing, that kind of anger and hatred was of no use. Gerard could no longer touch them and would no longer hurt Allison. For another, it was the rest of the world Chris was worried about.

London was never a safe place for the name of Argent to flourish.

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**A/N:** I decided to just upload this now, even if I haven't finished as many chapters as I'd like. All of this will be betaed by two people; my friends Ana (for storyline) and Nightmaric (for technicality). But of course if there are any mistakes, feel free to let me know. This is my first time writing Teen Wolf/Allison and my first time in a loooong time attempting to write HP, so constructive (but not rude) criticism and even just a line saying you like the direction this is going in is highly welcomed and appreciated.

The premise of this story centres around my feeling that Allison's journey to self-discovery after the events of season 2 were (understandably but in my opinion unfairly) omitted from the progression of the show. I wanted to take her through the five stages of grief and play around with the idea of crossing over werewolf mythologies. So in my story, I've moved HP up from 1995 to when TW is set (2012/2013) so as to coincide events of the Second Wizarding War and the werewolf massacre. Harry would be in his fifth year in the HP universe. We start on a relatively tight focus and work our way outwards to include everyone and I do intend this to be a bit of a slow burner.

Also... yes. Isaac dies. Allison needed to do something to really plunge into this despair, so one of them had to go. Moreover, someone as innocent and likeable as Isaac. It serves a purpose and doesn't reflect any kind of judgement I have on his character.

I switched France for London in the original TW narrative for obvious reasons.

And I think that's all I have to say for the time being! I hope you enjoy the story, and would very much like to hear from you. :) Thanks for reading.


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